the abyss is vast and empty
by ZRka
Summary: In which immortality brings tranquility to those who manage to overcome their desires, allowing all who do so to surpass the stars. The demon slayers are no longer necessary, but they don't know that yet. / Muzan-centric. Character study-ish. OOC. AU. Spoiler warning. For NaNoWriMo 2019.
1. This Is Where You Let Go

**I'm late to the party as per usual and binged all the manga chapters of KnY over the weekend a while ago. Thought it would make an appropriate choice for NaNoWriMo. Here we are.**

**Muzan's motive in the manga is to become perfect - meaning he'd have to rid himself of all weaknesses (of which he is noted to only have one), so he'd have to be able to walk under the sun whether that's through the Blue Spider Lily or absorbing Nezuko.**

**I call bullshit on that reason. Keep in mind that this guy can go around thinking humans are inferior and somehow casually be wandering the streets apparently married to a human with a son who is also human. Sure, maybe I forgot some details in the manga or whatever which justifies that but this contradiction is enough for me to say his character deserves a bit more depth.**

**Here I attempt to give this dude a more reasonable, human approach to his reason for conquering the sun. I know he's a narcissist and the "I want to be perfect" goal is technically enough for him but he's a complex character and there should be more than merely perfection he seeks. I think. It's my opinion, dammit.**

**TL;DR: The antagonist of the story deserves love too. (Also totally unrelated but he's pretty hot and I would be gay for him.)**

**Anyways. I dunno how to make him more human-like without destroying or at least modifying key components of his current character. Like the whole egocentric personality thing isn't going to work here. (Unless I go the psychology route and give him a traumatic backstory which explains the turn to narcissism, which, eh. Maybe if the manga gives us some more details, though even then I can't find much information about how narcissists are created compared to the things about how to deal with them.)**

**Here's the content. I doubt you'll like it. It boils down to rambling and doesn't even hit the 1k mark, let alone 2k.**

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_Prologue: This Is Where You Let Go_

* * *

"Your intentions don't matter. Perception is reality. If people perceive you the wrong way, it doesn't matter what your intentions are."

* * *

Muzan is a demon.

He is the first demon - the origin of all other demons, and the reason why the Demon Slayer Corps exists. It is he who is immortal, who can kill and change and give to others traits akin to him, and it is because of him that nobody else with his blood in their veins can walk under the sun. Muzan is a name hated and feared, and few know it (most who do are dead).

He wants to walk under the sun.

The sun is his one weakness - wisteria in general isn't potent enough to kill him and the smell never bothers him like it does with other demons. Cutting off his head with a nichirin blade will lead to regeneration. He can't die. At all. At least, not the same way that other would.

The sun, he knows, is fatal. He doesn't recall how he knows this like he doesn't recall much about those he turns into demons. All he knows is limited by the progress held by time.

He seeks the blue spider lily because it will allow him to wander under the warmth of the ball of fire, and to be freed from the chains held by the night, by the moon which shines bright on clear nights but not bright enough like the sun during clear days. And after all these years, he never finds it. Perhaps it was never in Japan to begin with - it matters little now.

Muzan _wanted_ to be perfect. He would be had he not killed the good doctor all those years ago.

(Yet he did. That would be his only regret in life, wouldn't it? He would not be able to walk under the sun, ever.)

He would never reach the ideal he held himself up to - and that single notion, that one thought seemingly harmless - changes him.

He is no longer obsessed with the sun because it is the one thing that makes him flawed. (He misses the sun, because under the sun walks all trains of life, and if he can't walk under the sun he might as well be dead.) He accepts this (does he really).

And _so what_ if it takes some hundreds to years to realize how his plans have yet to take fruit? That is perfectly fine, he thinks because when you have all the time in the world, what does it matter how long it takes to realize your mistakes. And he **stops**. He supposes he should have stopped years earlier, or never even bothered trying at all.

He stops seeking the blue spider lily medicine, stops bothering to create demons to serve his former goal, and he stops staying inside all the time.

He goes out, now, sometimes. At night. And he wanders amongst the humans, disguised as one of them, and that feeling deep down that tugs at him-

It must be hatred.

He hates humans, despises them, because _I used to be like that, too, able to come and go as I pleased under the bright blue sky_ and he is _angry_.

Humans: pathetic, sinful, and so beneath him. Humans don't last; their flesh is so soft and easy to tear through, and Muzan finds it laughable how simple it was to create more demons.

Yet.

A human is the one who comes close to defeating him.

Muzan, now maybe half a millennium old, is almost slain. It is an interesting thing he comes to understand. He is immortal, and despite this, he can die.

How laughable.

Muzan hates humans. He hates all of humanity, but he wouldn't turn them all into demons. No - humanity doesn't deserve that. Only a select few, those like him, who have been wronged by society, wronged by the world - they deserve this. To be a demon is not a good or a bad thing, it is like all other things, and it is what you make of it. And Muzan believes it to a gift, and a curse, mixed in one.

He still wants to walk under the sun, but he won't ever. The sun wouldn't instantly kill him, so he believes - he regenerates far too fast for that. So he would suffer instead before he fades away, and with him follows all the years of history he carries.

(In this world, there are not many things that last. Years past and demons come and go and countries across the sea rise and fall, and Muzan stays around. So do the Demon Slayer Corps.)

(Deep inside he knows there may lie fear, and it makes sense but he refuses to acknowledge it. Fear of what, death? He can't die - but he can't - but he won't. But, because he is the exception to the laws of nature.)

Muzan is not a human. However, once long ago, he was.


	2. My Demons

**My mom is mad because I blew off all my money on merchandise yesterday. I think she's getting frustrated with me. Sorry for the low quality again. It's not 2k, nothing makes sense here, and I'm trying to work things out between school stuff and this and everything else.**

**More info you don't care about; if I end up participating in my school's research program for psychology I think I'll pick up narcissism as my project (if that's possible, it might not be…). There's basically nothing I can find discussing how to a third party can help a narcissist become not-a-narcissist, which seems, uh. Yeah.**

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_Chapter 1: My Demons_

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"You can't turn an angel into a demon and blame them for being evil."

* * *

Muzan makes demons because some people deserve it.

He lets them know in advance what it entails, too - the whole "I can read your thoughts" and "you need my blood" and "you can't go out in the sun or you'll die" and "don't say my name or you'll die" shenanigans. They already know about the eating humans part, usually, and learn about wisteria and the demon slayers eventually.

He gives all the people he makes demons choices. Sometimes they don't want to be demons, and that's fine. He kills them. A swift death is merciful. These people have no reason to stay alive anymore.

Those he turns into demons, he gives them more things. His blood, for one thing. Power. And he lets them go, after telling them that he wants them to figure out a way to let him walk under the sun. In most cases the demons don't bother doing that and go around wrecking havoc only to be slain, but that's not really the point here.

The point is - Muzan wants to walk under the sun. He is immortal but he can die, and that contradiction is pretty big, so in the end, Muzan isn't immortal in the sense of forever living regardless of other circumstances and he craves the sunlight which is deadly, so. Another big contradiction there too.

(He doesn't care about the sun because he wants to be perfect. He cares because being a person - _which isn't the same as being a "human" _\- means being social, being alive during the day and he's a person too, right?)

(Even if he hates humans, there are things about being in a _society_ that he misses.)

Being mad is akin to being sad - it's just a different outward reaction, but inside you feel quite the same.

Muzan is old, and being old makes you tired.

He is not, however, suicidal. He knows the value in life because he has clung so desperately to it - he recognizes that he wants something he can't have.

So he settles for the next best thing.

…walking around at night instead.

He doesn't need sleep, doesn't need food, doesn't need water - he doesn't need anything, to be honest. But he craves things still, there are things he wants, like how humans have food and water and shelter and they desire still more, Muzan has time and an infinite amount of it and he wants _the sun _(he wants interaction).

He's good to go most of the time. He goes around and just… submerges himself. He ignores the heavy feeling in his chest and he is-

It feels… nice, almost.

Well, okay, there are those times where he ends up turning people into demons because he's compelled by a sudden wave of _disgust _but he chooses the people who seem to most angry or tired or _done._

And he gives them a reason to live. A reason to exist. They might serve him or they might not and in the end Muzan is left waiting for a solution that will never come.

Then the demon slayers come, and some die, and some kill demons, and it's merely a balance in the world. Some demons aren't strong enough, some humans aren't strong enough, and in the end everyone will die. Except Muzan, maybe.

Most things in the world are consistent in that way.

…Then Tamayo happened.

Tamayo is Muzan's first experience where he comes to realize there are other exceptions to the world, too. Other than Muzan. And the thought makes him - he's not sure what it's actually called, but it feels like an ugly (and freeing) feeling.

It begins like this: Muzan is wandering around Japan again. He's in some random town, like all the other ones, and he's around some other people on this one busy road. In the western calendar it would be sometime in the 18th century; he can't remember what year it was like in the old calendar.

So there he is, again, minding his own business. And he hears - er, sees - a woman being turned away from a travelling doctor with a pitiful expression and he thinks _it's one of those situations again isn't it._

And he's right. Because he sees her face and all at once, he empathizes. (That used to be me.)

They talk for a bit after he approaches her, and she says she has a husband and children and a disease that will kill her, and she can't find a cure, and that desperation reminds him of the doctor all those years ago, and Muzan when he was sick and looking for a cure, and-

He offers her a solution.

She readily accepts, and he doesn't think she listens when he's explaining the whole meaning behind being a demon, but she's persistent and he ends up giving her some of his precious blood.

The next night he comes back to see how it went (he's curious, did enjoy herself, did she-)-

...He finds corpses everywhere.

It stinks of blood and flesh.

And Tamayo is there, seething, and she's saying **he** killed her family and most of the people in this town, which is stupid because the last time he ate human was what, a year ago? Humans are so tasteless. He rarely eats anymore.

She screams at him, seething, and it takes some impressive willpower to stand there and listen to her continuous screaming.

_...hey. You do realize you drank my blood while knowing something like this could happen, right? The drinking my blood thing should've already been suspicious enough._

And he can hear all her thoughts aimed at him, and then she screams his name which is pretty stupid because she's going to die now-

But she doesn't.

And isn't that surprising?

He doesn't know how she managed it, yet she does, and in a fit of what is assumed to be rage or despair she flung herself towards him, a gross growl erupting from her, and he sends her back away from him with a punch.

She's weak. Of course she is, especially when compared to him. (Muzan is literally the strongest demon. That's irrefutable, and there's no point arguing it.)

Muzan sighs and walks up to her body lying on the floor, and in her eyes there is something he distinctly recognizes as a wild mix of emotions. He ponders killing her because if she's just going to do this massacre thing again then she's going to get killed by the demon slayers, and might as well kill her now or whatever since she's going to die anyways and she's being rather annoying.

Then he considers the fact that she's still alive, and decides to leave her be. Maybe she'll find a way to be an exception to the sun, and he can absorb her later on. So he goes. With some advice left behind, of course.

"You have all the time in the world now," he says. "Get your bearings. Find a reason to live. Or die."

That's how the world works.

He hears her cursing him in her head, and he really wishes humans were smarter than that (she asked him for it, and now she curses him for it, which is rather stupid)-

She didn't really deserve to be a demon, did she?

(A mistake on his part, but one that sprouted positive results.)

(Sometime later he hears about her and her apprentice, and he wonders, but he doesn't think much of it. Besides, he's halfway across the country and she's not quite immune to the sun.)


End file.
